Can I import the merchant's categories when importing products?

When you build your store, you create your own unique set of categories and add your unique selection of products to those categories. We do not support the importing of merchant categories (and their respective products) into your store to match the merchants' category structure. This is for a number of reasons:

1

Lack of uniqueness

Google likes unique websites. If we allow our customers to import merchants' categories and their respective products into their store, then there would be dozens if not hundreds of stores on the web exactly the same as yours.

2

Poorly organized categories

Many merchants don't provide detailed category information. For example, some merchants might put a high-heel shoe in the "Shoes" category whereas other merchants might place them in "Women's Clothes". In many cases, using the merchants' categorization structure won't work for your web store.

3

Missing category information

Often times, category information is not even provided for a product.

4

Lack of consistency

Merchants do not use the same taxonomy when organizing their products. One merchant might place their BBQ into the category "Lawn & Garden" whereas others might place their BBQ into the category "Cooking". This would result in your web store's different categories carrying the same type of products which in turn makes it very difficult for your site's visitors to find the product which they want to buy.